10-Minute Talks

Symbolic Liberalism and Dialogical Sociology

The British Academy — Fri, 27 Mar 2026 10:07:14 +0000

Classical liberalism, in the tradition of the philosopher John Rawls, upholds the value of equal basic liberties and the fair exercise of political power in societies where citizens have diverse and sometimes conflicting beliefs.

In this talk, Professor Sari Hanafi FBA explores the contemporary implementation of liberalism by social scientists, policymakers and decision takers in a time of increasing polarisation. Hanafi calls for a “dialogical sociology” to play a role in renewing a public sphere where diverse conceptions of the ‘good’ engage in open and reasoned discourse.

Speaker: Professor Sari Hanafi FBA

This video is for informative and educational purposes.

10-Minute Talks are a series of pre-recorded talks from Fellows of the British Academy screened on YouTube and also available on all podcasting platforms. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/10-minute-talks/id1530020476

This video was produced by https://www.haychdigital.com/

The British Academy convenes research insights from across the disciplines we represent. The views expressed in our videos are those of the contributors and do not reflect the views of the British Academy.

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Disability as a driver of change: depathologising the university

The British Academy — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 14:00:00 +0000

What happens when we centre disabilities as a driving subject of intellectual, personal and political inquiry?

Professor Dan Goodley FBA unpacks depathologisation in the university and the impact it can have on how we understand knowledge, power, and belonging.

Drawing on critical disability studies, this talk challenges the pathologising assumptions embedded in higher education and asks who benefits when disability is treated as a problem. Moving disability from margin to centre, it explores how depathologisation can transform universities from institutions that manage differences into communities that reimagine society.

Rather than a problem to be solved, disability becomes an opportunity for social change.

Speaker: Professor Dan Goodley FBA

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

This podcast was produced by https://www.haychdigital.com/

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Why and how are machine learning algorithms are driving polarisation?

The British Academy — Tue, 17 Feb 2026 17:00:00 +0000

A common criticism of social media is that groups of people are creating echo chambers that exclude different perspectives, but these echo chambers are a goal encoded in these platforms’ software, not an accident.

Wendy Chun FBA unpacks the role of homophily – the idea that similarity breeds connection, that ‘birds of a feather flock together’ – in how social media networks are designed. What can at first appear as simple technical defaults are the result of social and culturally influenced decisions. What if we built social media platforms that are not based on homophily?

Speaker: Professor Wendy Chun FBA

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

This podcast was produced by https://www.haychdigital.com/

Comments are open to viewers and are governed by the policies of YouTube. We do not monitor or moderate comments and will not reply to them.

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Fake News and the Victorians: Literature in the First Information Age

The British Academy — Fri, 05 Dec 2025 17:00:00 +0000

The 19th century became the age of the first information revolution. Driven by colonial and imperial geopolitics, rapid technological innovation, and the rise of mass print culture, news began to travel faster and farther than ever before. And so did questions of truth, authenticity and reliability. So, what can Victorian writers teach us about navigating misinformation today?

How did they respond to this changing media landscape? And what role did literature play in the way we engage with different kinds of information? In this video, Professor Pablo Mukherjee FBA unpacks how their insights into misinformation, media trust, and the speed of communication can help us understand and navigate today’s digital information age.

Speaker: Professor Pablo Mukherjee FBA

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

This podcast was produced by https://www.haychdigital.com/

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Figuring Forth: Cervantes’ Don Quijote, Poet in Prose

The British Academy — Fri, 21 Nov 2025 15:00:00 +0000

Cervantes’ groundbreaking novel, Don Quixote, is a comic but profound meditation on dreams, disillusionment and the blurred line between illusion and reality Its legacy is less timeless than differently meaningful across time, from the tragic idealism identified by the Romantics ( the term “quixotic” originates from Cervantes’ protagonist) to the metafictional complexity engaged with by modern critics.

Professor Isabel Torres explores how the ancient root of poetry, ‘poiesis’, comes alive in the creative madness of Cervantes’s protagonist, and the power of lyric in early modern Spain.

Speaker: Professor Isabel Torres FBA

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

10-Minute Talks are a series of pre-recorded talks from Fellows of the British Academy screened on YouTube and also available on all podcasting platforms.

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What can ancient civilisations teach us about sustainability?

The British Academy — Fri, 07 Nov 2025 14:00:00 +0000

A cosmology or worldview is the framework of beliefs and attitudes through which we interpret and make sense of the world, including how we think about our relationship with the environment. What can the worldviews of successful civilisations of the past teach us about sustainable technological and economic advancement?

Professor Shadreck Chirikure FBA explores how our current challenge of unsustainability can be transformed by learning from historical societies that balanced economic progress with stewardship for future generations.

Speaker: Professor Shadreck Chirikure FBA

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

10-Minute Talks are a series of pre-recorded talks from Fellows of the British Academy screened on YouTube and also available on all podcasting platforms.

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Why are cities an important part of climate change?

The British Academy — Fri, 24 Oct 2025 15:00:00 +0100

Cities are central to both the problems and solutions of the climate crisis.

Climate change is often seen as a global issue that can only be resolved at the international negotiating table, but research shows that its causes and solutions are profoundly urban. Geographer Harriet Bulkeley FBA explains how experimental action in cities can empower local groups beyond government and policy, and considers the questions of ethics, justice and equity that these actions generate for our collective futures.

Speaker: Professor Harriet Bulkeley FBA

This video is for informative and educational purposes.

10-Minute Talks are a series of pre-recorded talks from Fellows of the British Academy screened on YouTube and also available on all podcasting platforms.

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Tutankhamun’s Table: Food & Drink for a King

The British Academy — Fri, 29 Aug 2025 12:30:00 +0100

In 1922, the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb in the Valley of the Kings astounded archaeologists and the public alike. Beyond the ornate treasures, the tomb of the famous pharaoh offered insight into the daily life and diet of Ancient Egyptians. In this 10-Minute talk, Salima Ikram FBA delves into the findings of Tutankhamun’s chamber and what these reveal about resources, culinary practices, and beliefs during his time

Speaker: Professor Salima Ikram

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

Comments are open to viewers and are governed by the policies of YouTube. We do not monitor or moderate comments and will not reply to them.

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Judith Butler on Gender

The British Academy — Mon, 11 Aug 2025 10:42:46 +0100

“Gender studies as a discipline is by definition interdisciplinary, drawing from several paradigms, and it is defined by a set of debates and problematics, not by statements of doctrine or settled truths.” In this 10-Minute Talk, Judith Butler FBA discusses the conceptual contributions of gender as a field of study to a wide range of areas of research and teaching, and to social analysis and movements from the 1970s to the present.

Speaker: Professor Judith Butler FBA

This podcast was produced by https://www.haychdigital.com/

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Who invented the potato? And why should we care?

The British Academy — Fri, 25 Jul 2025 14:00:00 +0100

"How did Sir Walter Raleigh invent the potato?” In this 10-Minute Talk, Rebecca Earle FBA takes up Philomena Cunk’s question to explore the global history of the potato and explain why we should care.

Speaker: Professor Rebecca Earle FBA

This video was produced by https://www.haychdigital.com/

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The Man Who Shot Nelson: A French Take on Trafalgar

The British Academy — Fri, 11 Jul 2025 17:00:00 +0100

From a fake news report claiming a French victory to fictional memoirs and literary retellings, the Battle of Trafalgar’s legacy in France became shrouded in myth over the following years of the Nineteenth Century, particularly around the identity of the man who shot Nelson. In this 10-Minute Talk, Dr David McCallam recounts how the French responded to the crushing defeat in 1805 with satire and storytelling, offering a fascinating alternative perspective on a well-rehearsed historical event.

Speaker: Dr David McCallam

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

This podcast was produced by https://www.haychdigital.com/

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Why Truth is Not Enough

The British Academy — Fri, 27 Jun 2025 17:00:00 +0100

In a post-truth world, can we always trust data? And what about our human biases? Walking us through ‘the ladder of misinference’, Alex Edmans FBA outlines how statistics and studies can feed misinformation, and the tools we need to resist and make informed choices.

You can learn more from Professor Edmans on the subject in his recent book ‘May Contain Lies’ https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/455479/may-contain-lies-by-edmans-alex/9780241630181

Speaker: Alex Edmans FBA, Professor of Finance, London Business School

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

This podcast was produced by https://www.haychdigital.com/

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The 21st Century Resurgence of Eugenics

The British Academy — Fri, 13 Jun 2025 17:00:00 +0100

Eugenics is a coercive ideology with a destructive history over the course of the 19th and 20th Centuries. But did support for eugenics die out after the Second World War?

Unpacking the movement and its roots in academia, Rebecca Sear FBA explores the question of whether we are witnessing a resurgence in eugenics today.

Speaker: Rebecca Sear FBA, Professor and Director of the Centre for Culture and Evolution at Brunel University

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

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The Dead Sea Scrolls and Beginnings of Western Mysticism

The British Academy — Fri, 30 May 2025 16:50:14 +0100

What are the Dead Sea Scrolls? Who discovered them? And why are they important? Professor Philip Alexander FBA explores the history of the scrolls, and their role in uncovering the beginnings of Western Mysticism.

Want to learn more from the British Academy? Check out our Folklore Reimagined season on our website: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/seasons/folklore-reimagined/

Speaker: Professor Philip Alexander FBA

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

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The rise and fall of Matthew Hopkins, Witchfinder General

The British Academy — Fri, 11 Apr 2025 17:00:00 +0100

What really happened when a breakdown of the legal system in the English Civil War fuelled a series of witch-hunts? In this 10-Minute Talk, Professor Ronald Hutton FBA delves into England's witch trials and Matthew Hopkins, the self-proclaimed Witchfinder General.

For more from The British Academy’s Folklore Reimagined season, visit our website: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/seasons/folklore-reimagined/

Speaker: Professor Ronald Hutton FBA

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

10-Minute Talks are a series of pre-recorded talks from Fellows of the British Academy screened on YouTube and also available on all podcasting platforms.

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Schubert’s Die Forelle: how a classical music piece changes over time

The British Academy — Fri, 29 Nov 2024 17:30:00 +0000

Classical music is often wrongly considered to be unaffected by political and social change. Exploring Franz Schubert’s ‘Die Forelle’, Laura Tunbridge FBA considers the cultural history of a song and the importance of a piece of music changing over time – both in sound and meaning.

Speaker: Professor Laura Tunbridge FBA, Professor of Music, University of Oxford

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

Music included in this podcast:
02:28 - 'Die Forelle', performed as part of the Oxford International Song Festival www.oxfordsong.org by Irish soprano Ailish Tynan and pianist Iain Burnside.

Translation © Richard Wigmore, author of Schubert: The Complete Song Texts (Schirmer Books), provided via Oxford International Song Festival (www.oxfordsong.org).

07:12 - Schubert: Die Forelle, D. 550 (Orch. Britten) (Live), Anne Sofie von Otter, The Chamber Orchestra Of Europe & Claudio Abbado, from ‘Schubert: Orchestrated Songs’.

08:35 - "DIE Forelle!" from Arrangements and Derangements: Interpretations of Schubert (Arr. Michael Ching), performed by the ARK Trio: Allison Charney, soprano, Kajsa William-Olsson, cello, Reiko Uchida, piano.

10:09 - “Die Forelle” music by Franz Schubert, arranged by The Erlkings, English translation by Bryan Benner.

10-Minute Talks are a series of pre-recorded talks from Fellows of the British Academy screened each Friday on YouTube and also available on Apple Podcasts. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/10-minute-talks/id1530020476

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'Salvator Mundi': Leonardo da Vinci's missing masterpiece?

The British Academy — Fri, 15 Nov 2024 17:30:00 +0000

‘Salvator Mundi’ is a painting surrounded by mysteries. In this talk, Professor Martin Kemp FBA explores evidence that it is indeed a work of Leonardo Da Vinci, the painting’s key components, and the alleged whereabouts of the ‘Salvator Mundi’ today.

Speaker: Professor Martin Kemp FBA, Emeritus Professor of the History of Art, University of Oxford; Honorary Fellow, Trinity College, Oxford

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

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What does a neuropsychologist do?

The British Academy — Fri, 01 Nov 2024 16:24:29 +0000

What exactly is the work of a neuropsychologist? In this 10-Minute Talk, Professor Barbara Sahakian FBA unpacks some of her key work over the years and more recent ventures – from developing early models of memory testing to now transforming psychological tests into game apps.

Speaker: Professor Barbara Sahakian FBA, Professor of Clinical Neuropsychology, Department of Psychiatry and MRC/Wellcome Trust Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute, University of Cambridge

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

Please find a blog version of this talk here: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/blog/what-does-a-neuropsychologist-do/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=10mintalks&utm_content=copy

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Traditional Japanese theatre and audience interaction

The British Academy — Fri, 25 Oct 2024 17:03:17 +0100

Japanese theatre has, from its beginnings, encouraged audience participation – from formal fan-clubs to lessons on dancing and chanting. Hear Professor Drew Gerstle FBA take us through the key characteristics of Kabuki, Bunraku and Noh theatre and the ways viewers interacted with these 14th-17th century performances, both as patrons and amateur practitioners.

Speaker: Professor Drew Gerstle FBA, Emeritus Professor of Japanese Studies, SOAS University of London

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

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What are empires, nation states and colonialism?

The British Academy — Fri, 18 Oct 2024 15:34:39 +0100

How do we understand empire in the modern age? In this 10-Minute Talk, Professor Gurminder K Bhambra challenges the idea that modern nation-states emerged as a result of the break-up of empire, and instead invites us to rethink what defines empire entirely. By considering different colonial processes and the impact these have on how we understand empires, Bhambra unpacks the specific characteristics of European empire in the modern period.

Speaker: Professor Gurminder K Bhambra FBA, Professor of Postcolonial and Decolonial Studies, School of Global Studies, University of Sussex

This video is for informative and educational purposes.

For further reading, Professor Bhambra has recently published an article expanding on the themes of this talk: https://www.idunn.no/doi/10.18261/tfs.65.3.6

Please find a blog version of this talk here: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/blog/what-are-empires-nation-states-and-colonialism/?utm_source=transistor&utm_medium=podcast&utm_id=10-minute-talk

Subtitles, also known as closed captions, are available on our YouTube videos. You can access them by clicking on the 'CC' button or gear icon on the video. The 'CC' button and gear icon are usually located at the bottom of videos.

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Books in wartime: innocent victims or guilty parties?

The British Academy — Fri, 11 Oct 2024 17:00:00 +0100

While books are often thought of as victims of war, looted or burned in libraries, in this 10-Minute Talk Professor Andrew Pettegree suggests an alternative narrative: books are essential in the waging of war. Sharing insights from his recent publication, ‘The Book at War’, Pettegree explores the active role of books in wartime from the Napoleonic era to the Second World War.

Speaker: Professor Andrew Pettegree FBA, Professor of Modern History, University of St Andrews

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

For further reading, please see Professor Andrew Pettegree’s ‘The Book at War’ https://profilebooks.com/work/the-book-at-war/

Please find a blog-version of this talk here: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/blog/books-in-wartime-innocent-victims-or-guilty-parties/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=10mintalks&utm_content=cta

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What was the relationship between Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings?

The British Academy — Fri, 04 Oct 2024 16:42:31 +0100

Expanding on her book, ‘Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: An American Controversy’, Professor Annette Gordon-Reed unpacks the evidence around this contested relationship and the role of historians in erasing the narratives of enslaved people. Exploring the ‘American dilemma’, this talk investigates the contradiction between Jefferson’s commitment to equality and his ownership of enslaved people.

Speaker: Professor Annette Gordon-Reed FBA, Carl M Loeb University Professor, Harvard University

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

A blog version of this 10-Minute Talk is available: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/blog/what-was-the-relationship-between-thomas-jefferson-and-sally-hemings/

For further reading on this topic, please find Professor Annette Gordon-Reed's books here:
- https://www.waterstones.com/book/thomas-jefferson-and-sally-hemmings/annette-gordon-reed/9780813918334
- https://www.waterstones.com/book/the-hemingses-of-monticello/annette-gordon-reed/9780393337761

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Shakespeare in popular culture

The British Academy — Fri, 27 Sep 2024 16:00:00 +0100

What is it that makes great works from the past endure in the present? In this 10-Minute Talk, Professor Sir Jonathan Bate FBA explores Shakespeare’s legacy and his continued cultural presence over time. From influencing Jane Austen’s writing, to inspiring modern-day TV and film adaptations like 1999’s ‘10 Things I Hate About You’ and 2023’s ‘Anyone but You’, or providing a means for avoiding censorship, Shakespeare’s works live on in the present and bring the past back to life.

Speaker: Professor Sir Jonathan Bate FBA, Foundation Professor of Environmental Humanities, Arizona State University; Senior Research Fellow, Worcester College, University of Oxford

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

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What have sign languages taught us about human language development?

The British Academy — Fri, 20 Sep 2024 16:00:00 +0100

Sign language and how we use it and implement it into society has developed rapidly in the last 50 years, from little-to-no representation in education in the 1970s to the British Sign Language (BSL) Act 2022 and a new British Sign Language GCSE to be taught from 2025. In this 10-Minute Talk, Professor Bencie Woll FBA unpacks her research and involvement in understandings of language development, automatic translation between BSL and English, and recent political and education developments for BSL.

Speaker: Professor Bencie Woll FBA, Professor of Sign Language and Deaf Studies, University College London

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

For more information on BSL and research in Deafness Cognition, please visit:

BSL SignBank https://bslsignbank.ucl.ac.uk/
Deafness Cognition and Language Research Centre https://www.ucl.ac.uk/pals/research/deafness-cognition-and-language-research-centre-dcal

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Aesthetics and emotions in pre-modern India

The British Academy — Fri, 13 Sep 2024 15:00:00 +0100

In the West, emotions are often understood through the philosophy of cognition and experimental psychology – separated from the world of art and aesthetic. However, in pre-modern India, aesthetic and emotion were deeply intertwined. In this 10-Minute Talk, Professor Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad FBA discusses how the aesthetics of drama and literature were key to understanding emotions in the Sanskrit tradition, exploring ideas from Bharata’s treatise on drama to Abhinava Gupta’s theory of viewership. Hear his consideration of this ecology of affect, and the question of its role in our understanding of ourselves and others today.

Speaker: Professor Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad FBA, Distinguished Professor of Comparative Religion and Philosophy, Lancaster University

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

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Freud, Hollywood and the male gaze

The British Academy — Fri, 06 Sep 2024 15:00:00 +0100

In this 10-Minute talk, Laura Mulvey FBA responds to three key questions regarding her 1975 essay ‘Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema’. Returning to the origins of the essay and the concept of the ‘male gaze’, Mulvey explores the cultural climate of feminism and Hollywood which drove the conception of this now-cult term and the newer, controversial term ‘female gaze’.

Speaker: Laura Mulvey FBA, Professor of Film Theory, Birkbeck, University of London

This video is for informative and educational purposes.

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Genocide and International Law

The British Academy — Fri, 30 Aug 2024 15:00:00 +0100

‘Genocide’ (meaning “to kill a group”) was first used as a legal term in 1944 by Raphael Lemkin in the hope that it would come to signal the agreed limits of sovereign power, alongside the parallel developments of the concepts of human rights and crimes against humanity. Professor Philippe Sands Hon FBA explains the origins of the term, its implications and consequences in this 10-Minute Talk.

Speaker: Philippe Sands FBA, Professor of the Public Understanding of Law at University College London.

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

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Hannah Arendt's lessons for our times: the banality of evil, totalitarianism and statelessness

The British Academy — Wed, 28 Aug 2024 09:13:57 +0100

Hannah Arendt (1906-1975) was one of the most influential political theorists and philosophers of the 20th Century. In this 10-Minute Talk, Professor Lyndsey Stonebridge FBA explores three of Arendt's key concepts – totalitarianism, statelessness and the banality of evil – to explain the importance of her thinking for our times.

Speaker: Professor Lyndsey Stonebridge FBA, Professor of Humanities and Human Rights, University of Birmingham 

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

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What is extremism?

The British Academy — Fri, 16 Aug 2024 16:00:00 +0100

In a famous 1963 letter, Martin Luther King Jr. argued that ‘extremism’ is not an inherently bad thing because it can be a way of describing radical action for the extension of justice. Professor Quassim Cassam FBA explores what we mean by extremism, what makes an ideology or course of action extremist, and whether King was right.

Speaker: Quassim Cassam FBA, professor of philosophy at the University of Warwick

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South Asia, the partition of India and the birth of three nations

The British Academy — Fri, 09 Aug 2024 16:00:00 +0100

Following the partition of India in 1947 and the Bangladesh Liberation War in 1971, what was once one nation became three. Presenting anecdotes from her book 'Shadows at Noon' – a rich history sharing the stories of South Asia from the 20th century – Professor Joya Chatterji FBA discusses her view that India, Pakistan and Bangladesh have remained more similar than different, while acknowledging the difficulties of nationalism.

Speaker: Professor Joya Chatterji FBA

This video is for informative and educational purposes.

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Plato, Aristotle and the question of self: what makes you 'you'?

The British Academy — Fri, 02 Aug 2024 15:00:00 +0100

The question of what makes you ‘you’ has been a central theme in philosophical thought since ancient times. In this talk, Professor Richard Swinburne FBA takes us through the debates on personal identity, which were first had between Plato and Aristotle in the Western tradition. Through questioning the strength of the physicalist view, which says our personal identity is based on physical factors, he aims to demonstrate that maybe it is time to reconsider Plato’s belief in souls in the modern world.

Speaker: Professor Richard Swinburne FBA

This video is for informative and educational purposes.

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Coffee as connection – tradition, controversy and literary representations

The British Academy — Fri, 26 Jul 2024 13:37:42 +0100

Traversing the history of coffee through several literary examples, Professor Wen-chin Ouyang FBA explores coffee as not only a drink, but as tradition, commodity, and source of controversy. From the works of Mahmoud Darwish to Haruki Murakami, coffee has persisted as a social and intercultural tool. Hear more in her 10-Minute Talk.

Speaker: Wen-chin Ouyang FBA, Professor of Arabic and Comparative Literature, SOAS University of London

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Why politics fails

The British Academy — Fri, 19 Jul 2024 14:54:35 +0100

Sharing insights from his book 'Why Politics Fails', in this 10-Minute Talk Ben Ansell FBA unpacks the challenges of democracy. Given that humans rarely agree, there can be no such thing as the ‘will of the people’ – which is why it’s so difficult to override individual self-interest in favour of our collective interest in resolving some of our most pressing political problems. From the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth to Brexit, hear about the importance of losers’ consent and “agreeable” disagreement.

Please note, at 3:34 the spelling of the Sejm of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth should be S-E-J-M.

Speaker: Professor Ben Ansell, Professor of Comparative Democratic Institutions at the University of Oxford, and the BBC's 2023 Reith Lecturer.

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.
10-Minute Talks are a series of pre-recorded talks from Fellows of the British Academy, published on YouTube and also available on Apple Podcasts. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/10-minute-talks/id1530020476

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What makes us social? Autism, mentalising, and the need for new labels

The British Academy — Fri, 12 Jul 2024 15:31:58 +0100

How we understand autism has changed greatly over time. In this talk, Uta Frith FBA discusses developments in the scientific study of autism and its re-evaluation from a rarely diagnosed disorder to being conceptualised as a spectrum of neurodiversity. Autism can now be explored in relation to the mentalising system and other internal mechanisms that make us social.

Speaker: Professor Uta Frith, developmental psychologist and Emeritus Professor of Cognitive Development, University College London

This video is for informative and educational purposes.

10-Minute Talks are a series of pre-recorded talks from Fellows of the British Academy, published on YouTube and also available on Apple Podcasts. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/10-minute-talks/id1530020476

Find out more about the British Academy: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/

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The Lion of the 17th: the story of Georges Dukson and the Liberation of Paris

The British Academy — Fri, 05 Jul 2024 15:22:50 +0100

Gary Younge Hon FBA explores the French Liberation of 1944 and the story of Georges Dukson, "le Lion du 17ème", a soldier from French Equatorial Africa (now Gabon) who fought for the Free French forces during the liberation of Paris. Almost a million Africans, more than a million African Americans and roughly 16,0000 Caribbeans served in the Allied forces in the Second World War, but – often partly by design – their stories have rarely been heard. From the 'blanchissement' to the allied powers’ denial of the basic civil rights of Black and Brown people, Younge argues that the Second World War cannot be meaningfully understood as one for democracy or freedom.

Speaker: Professor Gary Younge Hon FBA, Professor of Sociology, University of Manchester; Journalist and author

This podcast is for informative and educational purposes.

Image credit: Georges Dukson, a Black soldier, is on the edge of the procession that General Charles de Gaulle is leading down the Champs-Élysées as part of the liberation of Paris. Photo by Serge DE SAZO / Gamma-Rapho / Getty Images.

Additional photos of Georges Dukson described in this talk can be viewed on this blog by Matthew Cobb: https://elevendaysinaugust.com/2013/03/09/georges-dukson-2/

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Tragedy and Postcolonial Literature

The British Academy — Wed, 29 Dec 2021 14:59:39 +0000

In this talk, Ato Quayson shares insights drawn from his book Tragedy and Postcolonial Literature. He argues that disputatiousness is one of the starting points that connects Greek and postcolonial tragedy.

Speaker: Professor Ato Quayson FBA, Professor of English, Stanford University

Image: Tragic mask in hand of greek statue of Melpomene. Via Getty Images

Hypermasculine leadership

The British Academy — Wed, 29 Dec 2021 14:03:49 +0000

In this talk, Georgina Waylen discusses hypermasculine leadership within the context of the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Speaker: Professor Georgina Waylen FBA, Professor of Politics, University of Manchester

Image: Donald Trump Holds Rally At Iowa State Fairgrounds. © photo by Scott Olson via Getty Images

The politics of humiliation

The British Academy — Wed, 29 Dec 2021 12:32:12 +0000

The modern history of humiliation is different from the history of public shaming; both share certain features and practices, but differ as to intentions and goals. In this talk, Ute Frevert argues that liberal societies have made some progress in abolishing public shaming. But they have failed to bring about “decency“ in Avishai Margalit’s terms – a general refusal to humiliate others.

She is the author of The Politics of Humiliation. A Modern History.

Speaker: Professor Ute Frevert FBA, Director, Max Planck Institute for Human Development

Image: Daniel Defoe in the Pillory. Credit duncan1890 via Getty Images.

Paradoxes of the Roman Arena

The British Academy — Wed, 29 Dec 2021 11:57:40 +0000

In this talk, Professor Kathleen Coleman FBA highlights certain paradoxes at the root of Roman civilisation, specifically those related to the staging of violent displays in the arena. Virtually everything that fueled Roman society can be implicated: ideology, religion, class structure, environment, economy. The Romans, evidently, tolerated these paradoxes. Can we learn anything from them?

Speaker: Professor Kathleen Coleman FBA, James Loeb Professor of Classics and the Departmental Chair, Harvard University

Image: The Colosseum in Rome. Credit Anna Kurzaeva via Getty Images

Public finances and the Union since 1707

The British Academy — Wed, 29 Dec 2021 11:16:37 +0000

In this talk, Professor Julian Hoppit FBA introduces his new book, The Dreadful Monster and its Poor Relations. Taxing, Spending, and the United Kingdom, 1707-2021, which explores the geography of public finances in the United Kingdom over the last three centuries. Why do some places feel they pay too many taxes and get too little public expenditure? Public finances have been at the heart of the making and the unmaking of the United Kingdom, but without much of a clear plan, allowing opposing caricatures of arrangements to become politically powerful.

Speaker: Professor Julian Hoppit FBA, Astor Professor of British History, University College London

Image: The Chancellor Of The Exchequer Delivers The 2021 UK Budget. © photo by Chris J Ratcliffe via Getty Images

The making of Oliver Cromwell

The British Academy — Tue, 28 Dec 2021 16:15:00 +0000

Oliver Cromwell (1599-1658) is, in terms of sheer achievement, the greatest English commoner of all time and yet remains a deeply controversial figure. He represented himself, apparently compellingly, as an honest, pious, modest, and selfless servant of God and his nation, and yet most of his contemporaries found him ruthless, devious, and self-promoting. In this talk, Ronald Hutton sums up the findings of his latest book, The Making of Oliver Cromwell, which examines his actions and words in full context up until the end of the English Civil War in 1651, and proposes an answer to this apparent paradox.

Speaker: Professor Ronald Hutton FBA, Professor of History, University of Bristol

Image: Statue of Oliver Cromwell in front of the Palace of Westminster, London, UK. Via Getty Images

Poetry as Experience

The British Academy — Tue, 28 Dec 2021 16:00:00 +0000

In this talk, Derek Attridge addresses the question: "What is a poem's mode of existence?" Using a poem by William Wordsworth as an example, he argues that poems are not fixed lines of words but human experiences of language and the power of language.

He is the author of The Experience of Poetry. From Homer's Listeners to Shakespeare's Readers.

Speaker: Professor Derek Attridge FBA, Professor Emeritus of English, University of York

Image: William Wordsworth engraving, 1873. Credit traveler1116 via Getty Images

Disastrous: thoughts on a pandemic inspired by ancient astrology

The British Academy — Wed, 08 Sep 2021 12:00:00 +0100

In this talk, Jane Lightfoot considers what a particular corner of the classical world, astrology, thought about disease – how it classified it, what mental models it built around it, and how it might have coped, or failed to cope, with the situation that is facing us today.

Speaker: Professor Jane Lightfoot FBA, Professor of Greek Literature; Charlton Fellow and Tutor in Classics, New College, University of Oxford

Image: Waning gibbous moon and Mars. © photo by japatino via Getty Images

The 1951 UN Refugee Convention: its origins and significance

The British Academy — Wed, 28 Jul 2021 13:00:00 +0100

In this talk, Peter Gatrell discusses the United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, signed in Geneva on 28 July 1951. He explains the circumstances leading up to the Refugee Convention and considers what it was designed to achieve: a commitment to recognise and protect refugees who have a well-founded fear of persecution. At present, although many of the world’s refugees live in non-signatory states, the Refugee Convention remains a crucial element of international refugee law.

His latest book is The Unsettling of Europe: the Great Migration, 1945 to the Present (Penguin, 2021). Details of his current collaborative research project, "Reckoning with refugeedom: refugee voices in modern history, 1919-75" are also available.

Speaker: Professor Peter Gatrell FBA, Professor of Economic History, University of Manchester

Image: New Temporary Refugee Camp In Lesbos Island. © Photo by Nicolas Economou / NurPhoto via Getty Images

Syntax: where the magic happens

The British Academy — Wed, 21 Jul 2021 10:00:00 +0100

Syntax is the cognitive system that underlies the patterns found in the grammar of human languages. In this talk, David Adger explains what syntax as an area of study is, why he finds it important and fascinating, and why it is central to what it means to be human.

The paperback edition of his book, Language Unlimited. The Science behind our most creative power was published in July 2021. His British Academy article, What is linguistics? is also available.

Speaker: Professor David Adger FBA, Professor of Linguistics, Queen Mary University of London

Looking at sign languages

The British Academy — Wed, 14 Jul 2021 13:00:00 +0100

This talk introduces research on the sign languages of deaf communities: natural, complex human languages, both similar to and different from spoken languages. It includes discussion of sign language and the evolution of human language; sign language and the brain, and sign language acquisition by young children, as well as the history and future of British Sign Language (BSL).

Speaker: Professor Bencie Woll FBA, Professor of Sign Language and Deaf Studies, University College London

10-Minute Talks are a series of pre-recorded talks from Fellows of the British Academy screened each Wednesday on YouTube and also available on Apple Podcasts. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast...

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The Shogun’s Silver Telescope: The East India Company and the English quest for Japan

The British Academy — Wed, 07 Jul 2021 10:00:00 +0100

Over the winter of 1610-11, a magnificent telescope was built in London. It was almost two metres long, cast in silver and covered with gold. This was the first telescope ever produced in such an extraordinary way, worthy of a great king or emperor. Why was it made, what was its political significance and who was it going to? In this talk, Timon Screech explores why the East India Company, which became the world's biggest trading organisation until the 20th century, prepared this special gift to court favour with the Shogun of Japan, how the Japanese viewed Europeans during this time and the impact on England’s maritime rivalry with Portugal and Spain.

His most recent books are
The Shogun’s silver Telescope; God, Art, and Money in the English Quest for Japan, 1600-1625 and
Tokyo before Tokyo; Power and Magic in the Shogun’s City of Edo (both published in 2020).

Speaker:
Professor Timon Screech FBA, Professor of the History of Art, SOAS University of London

Crèvecœur: What is an American?

The British Academy — Wed, 30 Jun 2021 13:00:00 +0100

J. Hector St. John de Crèvecœur (1735-1813) was a farmer as well as a complex thinker of the contradictions of American identity as described in his famous Letters from an American Farmer and, more strikingly, in his French texts which develop his description and analysis of the New World and its peoples. Many readers of his English work have focused on his wishful story of the land of the free, a hospitable refuge to the dispossessed of Europe, a glorious melting pot where the American is born: a man who works hard, who can provide for his family, and be treated with respect whatever his origins and whatever his religious beliefs. Yet, as Judith Still discusses in this talk, Crèvecœur reveals in his French work the original sins of British colonization and of the new United States, sins which still haunt us today: genocide of indigenous peoples, enslavement of Africans and environmental devastation.

She is the author of Derrida and Other Animals: The Boundaries of the Human (Edinburgh University Press, 2015) and ‘Slavery in Enlightenment America – Crèvecœur's Bilingual Approach’, Journal of Romance Studies (2018) 18:1, 103-29.

Goods and possessions in late medieval England

The British Academy — Wed, 23 Jun 2021 10:00:00 +0100

Goods and possessions offer us ways into understanding how late medieval people saw the world and their position in it. In this talk, Christopher Woolgar discusses objects of daily life, their significance and the meaning of material culture (what we might understand as ‘people’s stuff') in late medieval England, to reveal changes in mentality that came with a long-term social revolution, in the quantities and types of goods people had, and the lengths to which elites in particular went to ensure continued possession of prestigious items within their families.

Speaker: Professor Christopher Woolgar FBA, Emeritus Professor of History and Archival Studies, University of Southampton

Writing the history of the British Academy

The British Academy — Wed, 16 Jun 2021 10:00:00 +0100

The British Academy is the UK's national academy for the humanities and social sciences and was founded in 1902. In this talk, Professor Sir David Cannadine discusses undertaking the task of writing the history of the Academy and why it is worth doing so, the importance of engaging with the challenging moments it has faced and how these were navigated, and if the history of the Academy is merely the history of a single institution or if it sheds light on how institutions more widely can enhance public understanding of people, cultures and societies.

Speaker: Professor Sir David Cannadine PBA, President, the British Academy; Dodge Professor of History, Princeton University

The Early Foucault

The British Academy — Wed, 09 Jun 2021 11:49:06 +0100

In this talk Stuart Elden discusses his new book, The Early Foucault and the research he did on the first period of Michel Foucault’s career. In particular, he highlights what Foucault did before the History of Madness in 1961 and how he came to write that book as well as the way newly available archival materials help to make sense of the period.

His book, The Early Foucault, was published in June 2021.

Speaker: Professor Stuart Elden FBA, Professor of Political Theory and Geography, University of Warwick

George II Augustus von Welf, British King and German Prince-Elector

The British Academy — Wed, 26 May 2021 10:00:00 +0100

George II, King of Great Britain and Ireland and Elector of Hanover from 1727-60, was considered short-tempered and uncultivated, but during his reign presided over a great flourishing in his adoptive country - economic, military, and cultural. In this talk, Norman Davies places George II in the unfamiliar framework of a composite state, stressing the monarch's conviction that his native German possessions were no less important than his British ones, together with the unfamiliar story of how his German Electorate was governed from St. James’s Palace in London. He also discusses his book, George II: Not Just a British Monarch, and its use of unconventional terminology, calling the monarch 'George Augustus' (not just George II), insisting that he was 'King-Elector' not just a mere King, that he belonged to the dynasty of Von Welf (the Guelphs) not to the invented tribe of 'Hanoverians', and that his coat-of-arms, which, inter alia, bore the crown of the Holy Roman Empire, was 'royal and electoral', not just, as the British always say, 'royal'.

Speaker: Professor Norman Davies FBA, Professor Emeritus of History, University of London; Honorary Fellow, St Antony’s College, University of Oxford; Honorary Fellow, Clare Hall, University of Cambridge

The Spectre of War - International Communism and the Origins of World War II

The British Academy — Wed, 19 May 2021 10:00:00 +0100

Why was there no alliance to block Hitler from launching aggression in Europe? The usual explanation given is that the British led by Neville Chamberlain were so averse to the thought of war that appeasement had no alternative. In this talk, Jonathan Haslam argues that the real reason was that they - as did the Poles and the Czechs - feared communism more than fascism and that an alliance with Stalin's Russia against Germany would bring the Reds into Central Europe. As Moscow supported Communist efforts in France, Spain, China, and beyond, opponents such as the British feared for the stability of their global empire and viewed fascism as the only force standing between them and the Communist overthrow of the existing order.

His book, The Spectre of War: International Communism and the Origins of World War II is published in May 2021.

Speaker: Professor Jonathan Haslam FBA, George F. Kennan Professor, School of Historical Studies, Institute for Advanced Study

Image: Photograph of German soldiers advancing on Poland during World War II.

Women and mental health – talking about feelings

The British Academy — Wed, 12 May 2021 10:00:00 +0100

During the COVID-19 pandemic women’s mental health has been a topic of concern as women have disproportionately carried the burden of care. In this talk, Lynn Abrams explores the links between a revolution in feelings amongst women in the 1960s and today’s mental health crisis. She shows how talking about feelings and self-help were alternatives to the ‘little yellow pill’ for many women struggling with loneliness and stress.

Speaker: Professor Lynn Abrams FBA, Professor of Modern History, University of Glasgow

Napoleon and God

The British Academy — Wed, 05 May 2021 10:00:00 +0100

Napoleon had no religion, but he spent much of his career dealing with it. In this talk to mark the bicentenary of his death, William Doyle discusses how Napoleon saw that the upheavals of the French Revolution could never be ended unless its quarrel with the Catholic Church could be settled. This meant negotiating with the pope. Most of Napoleon's henchmen opposed the concordat which he concluded with Rome in 1801, but most French people welcomed it. Later, emperor and pope fell out, but public worship was never threatened again, as the pope always acknowledged with gratitude.

He is the author of The Oxford History of the French Revolution.

Speaker: Professor William Doyle FBA, Professor Emeritus of History and Senior Research Fellow, University of Bristol

Choosing a title – George Eliot and 'The Mill on the Floss'

The British Academy — Wed, 28 Apr 2021 10:00:00 +0100

By late 1859, when she had almost finished writing her second novel, The Mill on the Floss, George Eliot was still unsure of its final title. Two other possible titles, ‘Sister Maggie’ and ‘The House of Atreus’ were under consideration almost up to the time of printing and in this talk, Rosemary Ashton discusses the case of The Mill on the Floss in the wider context of novel writing and title choosing.

She is the author of several books which include discussion of George Eliot's writings, including the biography of her, George Eliot: A Life .

Speaker: Professor Rosemary Ashton FBA, Emeritus Quain Professor of English Language and Literature and Honorary Fellow, University College London

More than one language - why bilingualism matters

The British Academy — Wed, 21 Apr 2021 10:00:00 +0100

Research shows that multilingualism in any languages, regardless of prestige or worldwide diffusion, can provide a range of linguistic, cognitive, and social benefits at all ages. It enables communication with international partners and understanding of local cultures as well as enhancing metalinguistic awareness, focusing, seeing both sides of an argument, and flexibly adapting to changing circumstances. However, as Antonella Sorace outlines in this talk, there are still many misconceptions about multilingualism and this contributes to the lack of language skills in countries, like the UK, that rely on ‘privileged monolingualism’ in English, which can undermine social cohesion and economic growth.

Given what is at stake, it is important to bridge the gap between research and communities to enable informed decisions in society regarding the benefits of speaking more than one language.

The British Academy, working with the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the Association of School and College Leaders, the British Council and Universities UK, published 'Towards a National Languages Strategy: Education and Skills' for the education and skills component of a UK-wide national languages strategy in July 2020.

Speaker: Professor Antonella Sorace FBA, Professor of Developmental Linguistics and Director of Bilingualism Matters, University of Edinburgh

The miners’ strike of 1984-85

The British Academy — Wed, 14 Apr 2021 10:00:00 +0100

The miners’ strike of 1984-85 can be considered the last great battle of the organised industrial working class in the UK. The defeat of the strike led to deindustrialisation, the rapid closure of pits, the redundancy of the miners and the hollowing out of mining communities which impacts politics to this day.

In this talk, Robert Gildea examines the miners’ strike through the lenses of class, community, and family, how it was both a performance and crisis of masculinity, and how the men and women involved reinvented themselves afterwards.

He is currently writing an oral history of the 1984-85 miners' strike based on the research project, ‘Class, community and family: the 1984-1985 miners’ strike in history and memory’.

Speaker: Professor Robert Gildea FBA, Professor of Modern History, University of Oxford

Image: Demonstrators during the National Miners Strike in 1984 out in force at Sunderland's Wearmouth Colliery, demonstrating their solidarity as an NCB deadline to abandon the pit approached on 11 October 1984. Photo by NCJ Archive / Mirrorpix / Getty Images.

The nature of friendship

The British Academy — Wed, 07 Apr 2021 10:00:00 +0100

What is it to be friends with someone? Why do we have friends? What do they do for us? In this talk, Robin Dunbar provides evidence that friendships are good for us, the relationship between the number and quality of close friendships and our psychological and physical health, and on what basis we select our friends.

His book, Friends. Understanding the power of our most important relationships was published in March 2021.

Speaker: Professor Robin Dunbar FBA, Professor of Evolutionary Psychology, University of Oxford

Spinoza on philosophising

The British Academy — Wed, 31 Mar 2021 10:00:00 +0100

Philosophy, as Spinoza understands it, is the art of learning to live as joyfully and securely as we can. But because we can only practice this art collectively, philosophising is always a partly political project - a matter of learning to live together peacefully and harmoniously. What enables us to do this? In this talk Susan James discusses how some of Spinoza’s answers, especially his analysis of natural right, jolt our assumptions and make us reconsider the problem.

Her book, Spinoza on Learning to Live Together was published in 2020.

Speaker: Professor Susan James FBA, Professor of Philosophy, Birkbeck, University of London

Image: Portrait of Benedictus de Spinoza (1632-1677) circa 1665. Gemäldesammlung der Herzog-August-Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel, Germany, via Wikimedia Commons.

Dealing with the past in Northern Ireland

The British Academy — Wed, 24 Mar 2021 13:00:00 +0000

Dealing with the past in relation to the Northern Ireland conflict is a politically sensitive topic often characterised by more heat than light. In this talk, Kieran McEvoy discusses the UK government’s commitment to introduce legislation regarding legacy issues now complicated by the parallel drive to protect British Army veterans from historical allegations arising out of their service in Northern Ireland.

Speaker: Professor Kieran McEvoy FBA, Professor of Law and Transitional Justice, School of Law and Senior Research Fellow, Senator George J Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security and Justice, Queen’s University Belfast; Principal Investigator, Dealing with the Past in Northern Ireland project.

This talk was part of the Imagine! Belfast Festival of Ideas and Politics.

Image: British soldier on patrol along Falls Road in West Belfast. © Photo by Andrew Holbrooke / Corbis Historical via Getty Images.

What does the Good Friday Agreement mean?

The British Academy — Wed, 24 Mar 2021 13:00:00 +0000

As the Good Friday Agreement moves closer and closer to centre stage in Anglo-Irish relations, and potentially to UK-EU relations post-Brexit, how it is interpreted will become even more contentious. In this talk, Christopher McCrudden engages with the differing (and conflicting) historical, legal, and political interpretations as well as considering more broadly, what exactly is the Agreement?

Speaker: Professor Christopher McCrudden FBA, Professor of Human and Equality Law, Queen’s University Belfast

This talk was part of the Imagine! Belfast Festival of Ideas and Politics.

Image: British Prime Minister Tony Blair (right) US Senator George Mitchell (centre) and Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern (left) shaking hands after they signed the historic Good Friday Agreement for peace in Northern Ireland. © Dan Chung / AFP via Getty Images.

The history of Belfast, a strange case of shared identity and sectarian division

The British Academy — Wed, 24 Mar 2021 13:00:00 +0000

In this talk, Marianne Elliot reflects on the existence and history of a 'shared space' Belfast identity, focusing particularly on the 1940s and 1950s, but also on post-Good Friday Agreement efforts to restore 'shared' living spaces, so damaged by the Northern Ireland Troubles.

Speaker: Professor Marianne Elliot FBA, Professor Emerita, Institute of Irish Studies, University of Liverpool

This talk was part of the Imagine! Belfast Festival of Ideas and Politics.

Image: Children marching for peace. © Leif Skoogfors / Corbis Historical via Getty Images.

China’s 14th Five Year Plan – the bold and the beautiful

The British Academy — Wed, 17 Mar 2021 10:00:00 +0000

Every five years since 1953, the Chinese Communist Party has produced a strategic blueprint setting out the broad framework and specific targets meant to guide policy and performance nationwide, across government, economy, and society. In this talk, Vivienne Shue discusses the preparation, substance and political timing of China's new 14th Five Year Plan and considers whether its bold objectives are attainable.

Speaker: Professor Vivienne Shue FBA, Professor Emeritus of Contemporary China Studies, Fellow of St. Antony's College, and an Associate of the University of Oxford China Centre

Image: Photo of Chinese President Xi Jinping by Lintao Zhang via Getty Images.

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-china-14th-five-year-plan-bold-beautiful/

In praise of Queen Astrid of Norway

The British Academy — Wed, 10 Mar 2021 10:00:00 +0000

In this talk, Judith Jesch introduces Astrid, a Swedish princess married to King, later Saint, Olaf of Norway, and her remarkable political intervention to ensure that her stepson succeeded to the throne in 1035 CE. Her actions are immortalised in a contemporary poem, composed in a genre previously reserved for male rulers, which shows how both she and the poet Sigvatr were pioneers in the transformation of the Norwegian monarchy at the end of the Viking Age.

An annotated text and translation of the poem in praise of Astrid is available.

A related article by Judith is also available: ‘In praise of Ástríðr Óláfsdóttir’, Saga-Book 24 (1994), 1-18.

Speaker: Professor Judith Jesch FBA, Professor of Viking Studies, University of Nottingham

Image: Astrid Olofsdotter of Sweden as imagined by artist Christian Krohg in 1899.

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-praise-queen-astrid-norway

The power of stories and the practice of rhetoric

The British Academy — Wed, 03 Mar 2021 10:00:00 +0000

With the rise of the internet and social media, the performance of storytelling and the arts of oratory have returned to centre stage. In this talk ahead of World Book Day, Marina Warner argues that in an era of public disinformation, the study of the uses of rhetoric, as deployed in many forms of literature, is urgently needed. Rhetoric used to be a pillar of literary education, and understanding its processes remains vital to sharpening epistemic vigilance and developing countermeasures to the damaging falsehoods and rumours in circulation. Literature and imagination, action and reality interact through narratives and how convincingly they are told matters. Between stories that open minds and stories that close them, rhetoric – the modes and voices of storytelling – plays a crucial role.

Her memoir, Inventory of a Life Mislaid: An Unreliable Memoir is published on 4 March 2021.

Speaker: Professor Dame Marina Warner FBA, FRSL, Professor of English and Creative Writing, Birkbeck, University of London; Distinguished Fellow, All Souls College, University of Oxford; Professorial Research Fellow, SOAS; and President of the Royal Society of Literature

Image: Professor Dame Marina Warner FBA. Photograph by Edward Park

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-power-stories-practice-rhetoric/

The death of John Keats and his early reputation

The British Academy — Wed, 24 Feb 2021 10:00:00 +0000

In this talk to mark the bicentenary of the Romantic poet John Keats’ death on 23rd February 1821 in Rome, Nicholas Roe takes us back to the hours, days, and weeks immediately afterwards as well as discussing how Keats’ reputation evolved in posthumous years. He is the author of John Keats. A New Life.

Speaker: Professor Nicholas Roe FBA, Bishop Wardlaw Professor of English Literature, University of St Andrews

Image: John Keats by William Hilton, after Joseph Severn. Oil on canvas, based on a work of circa 1822. 30 in. x 25 in. (762 mm x 635 mm) Purchased, 1865. © National Portrait Gallery, London (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0)

The origins of Stonehenge

The British Academy — Wed, 17 Feb 2021 10:00:00 +0000

Where did Stonehenge come from? In this talk Mike Parker Pearson investigates the origins of Stonehenge, its stones and their transportation as well as speculating on the motives behind the creation of this unique prehistoric monument.

Read more about Stonehenge's origins by him on the Academy's blog and in a new article in the Antiquity journal.

Speaker: Professor Mike Parker Pearson FBA, Professor of British Later Prehistory, University College London

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-origins-stonehenge/

Charles Darwin and ideas of evolution

The British Academy — Wed, 10 Feb 2021 22:00:00 +0000

Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution changed the way we think about our place in the world, although it took some time for its full implications to sink in. In this talk, Peter Bowler argues that at first it was widely assumed that humanity must be the goal of evolutionary progress. But Darwin’s theory of natural selection suggests that the ‘tree of life’ has many diverging branches and hence no predetermined endpoint. Humanity’s position in the world now seemed much less secure, although it took several decades for this unsettling prospect to be recognised.

His book, Progress Unchained: Ideas of Evolution, Human History and the Future will be published by Cambridge University Press in March 2021.

This talk is to mark Darwin Day, a celebration to commemorate the birthday of Charles Darwin on 12th February 1809.

Speaker: Professor Peter Bowler FBA, Emeritus Professor of the History of Science, Queens University Belfast

Image: The Origin of Species by Charles Darwin.

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-charles-darwin-ideas-evolution/

Saladin and the Crusades: medieval and modern perspectives

The British Academy — Wed, 03 Feb 2021 10:00:00 +0000

What has been the legacy of the Crusades in Europe and across the Muslim world in modern times? Why is the evolution of the Saladin legend throughout history so remarkable? In this talk, Carole Hillenbrand argues that whilst the word ‘crusade’ is still used today with little heed to the historical context in which it first appeared, it is abundantly clear at both a scholarly and more popular level that there is now a continuing and genuine interest in discovering more about the phenomenon of the Crusades in the Middle Ages and especially Islamic perspectives.

Her article, ‘The evolution of the Saladin legend in the West’ (2006) is available.

Speaker: Professor Carole Hillenbrand FBA, Professor of Islamic History, University of St Andrews; Professor Emerita of Islamic History, University of Edinburgh

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-saladin-crusades-medieval-modern-perspectives

Donald Trump, Boris Johnson and warnings from Hannah Arendt

The British Academy — Wed, 27 Jan 2021 09:16:17 +0000

In The Origins of Totalitarianism (1951) the political thinker Hannah Arendt warned of the dangers if the distinction between fact and fiction – and between true and false – is lost. Aware of the fragility of democracy, Arendt argued that democracy depends on populations accepting facts about social life; without such shared facts, democracy can be imperilled. What happens though when facts become matters of opinion?

In this 10-Minute Talk Michael Billig discusses the works of Hannah Arendt and why they may help us understand recent events involving President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

Speaker: Professor Michael Billig FBA, Emeritus Professor of Social Sciences, Loughborough University

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-donald-trump-boris-johnson-warnings-hannah-arendt/

Atheism in debate

The British Academy — Wed, 20 Jan 2021 10:00:00 +0000

Heralded as the exponents of a 'new atheism', critics of religion such as Richard Dawkins are highly visible and vocal today. In this talk, David Fergusson explains the growing interest in the study of atheism and the different forms that this now takes. He suggests that faith communities can benefit from patient engagement with their critics, even while resisting the reductive explanations of the new atheism. Speaker: Professor David Fergusson FBA, Professor of Divinity, University of Edinburgh (From 1 April 2021, he will take up the Regius Chair of Divinity at the University of Cambridge.)

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-atheism-debate/

Religion, theology and the ultimate nature of reality

The British Academy — Wed, 16 Dec 2020 10:00:00 +0000

In this talk, Keith Ward argues that most sophisticated religions are correct in thinking that there exists a spiritual dimension of reality based on wisdom, compassion and bliss as well as addressing how we can understand the phenomena of religion in the light of new scientific and global understanding.

Speaker: Revd Professor Keith Ward FBA, Professor of Philosophy of Religion, Roehampton University

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-religion-theology-and-the-ultimate-nature-of-reality/

Racism and religion in America – sin and the elusive 'problem of seeing'

The British Academy — Wed, 09 Dec 2020 10:30:00 +0000

The Unites States remains unusually religious as a country, but the issue of American racism is inextricably, and very problematically, related to its theological past. The history of white American Christianity is replete with biblical mandates for a racist system, and this may well have wider explanatory implications for police violence against non-white people and the strange incapacity of white people to 'see' elements of 'systemic racism' in the culture at large.

Join Sarah Coakley as she explores some of the uncomfortable truths about the historic power of Christianity in the US, and the importance of both theological and philosophical analyses of the 'problem of seeing' what is happening in a racist culture.

Speaker: Revd Professor Sarah Coakley FBA, Professorial Fellow, Australian Catholic University; Honorary Professor, University of St Andrews; Honorary Fellow, Oriel College, University of Oxford; Norris-Hulse Professor Emeria, University of Cambridge

Episode Image Credit: Joy Powell / AFP / Stringer via Getty Images.

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-racism-and-religion-in-america-sin-and-the-elusive-problem-of-seeing/

The Hitler Conspiracies

The British Academy — Wed, 02 Dec 2020 10:00:00 +0000

Conspiracy theories are becoming more popular and more widespread in the twenty-first century. Nowhere have they become more obvious than in revisionist accounts of the history of the Third Reich and how Adolf Hitler supposedly didn’t die in 1945 but survived and lived into old age in Argentina.

In this talk, Sir Richard Evans explains how conspiracy theories are constructed, amplified, and justified as well looking more widely at how the most bizarre and irrational theories find their way into the public sphere.

His book, The Hitler Conspiracies. The Third Reich and the Paranoid Imagination was published in October 2020. An abridged version of this talk will also feature as an article in the New Statesman on 4th December 2020.

Speaker: Professor Sir Richard Evans FBA, Provost, Gresham College, London

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-the-hitler-conspiracies-the-third-reich-and-the-paranoid-imagination/

The function of cynicism at the present time

The British Academy — Wed, 25 Nov 2020 10:15:48 +0000

Broadly described, a cynic (in the primary modern sense) is a person given to casting doubt on the motives that drive other people. Often disparaged, cynicism is nevertheless part of the range of ways in which most of us may sometimes choose to engage with others – momentarily tuning up the aggression of our own intelligence.

In this talk, Helen Small considers the characteristic features of cynicism, its origins and development as a philosophical branch, and what role it has played in public moralism from the 19th century onward. Treating a range of literary and philosophical writers, she explores the strengths and limitations of cynicism in our present cultural context, amid what is widely seen as a weakening of the norms of expression for public arguments.

Her book, 'The Function of Cynicism at the Present Time' was published by Oxford University Press in June 2020.

Speaker: Professor Helen Small FBA, Merton Professor of English Language and Literature, University of Oxford

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-transcript-the-function-of-cynicism-at-the-present-time/

Dark data

The British Academy — Wed, 18 Nov 2020 10:38:07 +0000

In the era of big data, it is easy to imagine that we have all the information we need to make good decisions. But in fact, the data we have is never complete. Just as much of the universe is composed of dark matter, invisible to us but nonetheless present, the universe of information is full of dark data that we overlook at our peril.

In this talk David Hand explores dark data in the context of COVID-19 and the many ways in which we can be blind to missing data and how that can lead us to conclusions and actions that are mistaken, dangerous, or even disastrous. He also outlines how the pandemic has raised awareness of the importance of valid, relevant, timely, and accurate data and even how dark data can be used to our advantage, leading to greater understanding and better decision-making.

His book, 'Dark Data: Why What You Don’t Know Matters' was published by Princeton University Press in January 2020.

Speaker: Professor David Hand FBA, Emeritus Professor of Mathematics, Imperial College, London; Senior Research Investigator, Imperial College London

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-transcript-dark-data/

Domestic and sexual violence during COVID-19

The British Academy — Wed, 11 Nov 2020 09:39:06 +0000

Pandemics throughout history have provided stark reminders of how the vulnerable can be exploited and abused and COVID-19 is no different.

In this talk, Joanna Bourke outlines how the pandemic has exacerbated, not created, the problem of domestic and sexual violence in our society and how perpetrators have also used fear of the virus as a weapon as part of their arsenal of abuse.

Speaker: Professor Joanna Bourke FBA, Professor of History, Birkbeck, University of London; Principal Investigator on the Wellcome Trust-funded project, ‘Sexual Violence, Medicine, and Psychiatry’ (2018-2023)

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-domestic-and-sexual-violence-during-covid-19/

Science hasn't refuted free will

The British Academy — Wed, 04 Nov 2020 10:17:13 +0000

It is often suggested that free will is an illusion and a left-over from an outdated worldview; and that the idea of free will has no place in modern science. In this talk, Christian List argues that far from undermining free will, science actually offers some arguments in its support.

Christian List’s 10-Minute Talk is based on his identically-titled article published in the Boston Review in February 2020. His book, 'Why Free Will is Real' was published in 2019.

Speaker: Professor Christian List FBA, Professor of Philosophy and Political Science, London School of Economics

Transcript: • https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-science-hasnt-refuted-free-will

Early Medieval Wales – a matter of identity

The British Academy — Wed, 28 Oct 2020 11:31:00 +0000

How did people in early medieval Wales live? And how did their lives change between the departure of the Romans in the early fifth century AD and the coming of the Normans to Wales over 600 years later? In this 10-Minute Talk, Nancy Edwards considers some remarkable archaeological monuments, highlighting what these reveal about aspects of identity during this period.

Speaker: Professor Nancy Edwards FBA, Professor of Medieval Archaeology, Bangor University

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-early-medieval-wales-a-matter-of-identity/

What defenders of the slave trade have to teach us

The British Academy — Wed, 21 Oct 2020 10:39:21 +0100

The eighteenth-century writers who tried to mount a principled defence of the slave trade look like monsters to us today - quite rightly. But before we get on our high horses to condemn them, it’s worth hearing how uncomfortably closely their arguments anticipate patterns of thought in which most of us are implicated today.

Speaker: Professor Alec Ryrie FBA, Professor of the History of Christianity, Durham University; Professor of Divinity, Gresham College

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-what-the-defenders-of-the-slave-trade-have-to-teach-us/

Why laughter matters

The British Academy — Wed, 14 Oct 2020 06:51:27 +0100

In this 10-Minute Talk, cognitive neuroscientist Sophie Scott introduces her pioneering research into laughter. She talks about why we laugh, laughter’s role in social interactions and how laughter can help us to regulate emotions and improve our mood.

Speaker: Professor Sophie Scott FBA, Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-why-laughter-matters/

Britain and Europe in a Troubled World

The British Academy — Wed, 07 Oct 2020 10:28:04 +0100

Is Britain a part of Europe? Ahead of the publication of his latest book Britain and Europe in a Troubled World, Vernon Bogdanor untangles the history of Britain’s complex relationship with Europe and discusses how the EU needs to change if it is to avoid losing more member states. Spanning the last 75 years, this 10-Minute Talk provides the essential background to the struggle over Brexit.

His latest book, 'Britain and Europe in a Troubled World' will be published in November 2020. You can get 30% off when you pre-order the book by entering the code YBETW when prompted at checkout on Yale University Press (https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300245615/britain-and-europe-troubled-world). The code is valid until 31 December 2020 and some restrictions apply*.

Speaker: Professor Vernon Bogdanor FBA, Research Professor, Institute of Contemporary British History, King's College London

*Customers from the US and Canada may claim the book discount code by emailing Yale University Press. International orders will be subject to variable international shipping rates and potential customs charges. Unfortunately, the code is not valid for customers in Australia and New Zealand.

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-britain-and-europe-in-a-troubled-world/

The crisis of the meritocracy - why Britain has needed more and more education

The British Academy — Wed, 30 Sep 2020 09:35:14 +0100

Before the Second World War, only about 20% of the population had any secondary education or only a few percent went to university; today secondary education has long been universal and 50% go to higher education. How and why did we get here from there? Peter Mandler talks about his new book The Crisis of the Meritocracy and explains why Britain, like most other modern societies, has needed to educate ever larger proportions of its citizenry to ever high levels.

Speaker: Professor Peter Mandler FBA, Professor of Modern Cultural History, University of Cambridge; Bailey Lecturer in History, Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-the-crisis-of-the-meritocracy-why-britain-has-needed-more-and-more-education/

COVID-19 and inequalities

The British Academy — Wed, 23 Sep 2020 10:35:31 +0100

The COVID-19 pandemic has been unequal and complex in its social and economic impact. It has amplified existing inequalities and has created new insecurities some of which threaten to persist into the future. Fiona Williams will unpick the dynamics and indicate what priorities they pose for social policies.

The British Academy’s Shape the Future programme examines the societal, economic and cultural implications of the pandemic.

Speaker: Professor Fiona Williams FBA, Emeritus Professor of Social Policy, University of Leeds; Research Associate, Centre on Migration, Policy and Society, University of Oxford; Honorary Professor, Social Policy Research Centre, University of New South Wales, Australia

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-covid-19-and-inequalities/

Entrepreneurship

The British Academy — Wed, 16 Sep 2020 09:30:39 +0100

In this talk, Rajesh Chandy discusses a topic he has been studying for several years: entrepreneurship. What is entrepreneurship? What are its drivers? And why does it matter to all of us – entrepreneurs, employees, and observers alike?

Speaker: Professor Rajesh Chandy FBA, Professor of Marketing, London Business School; Tony and Maureen Wheeler Chair in Entrepreneurship; Academic Director, Wheeler Institute for Business and Development

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-entrepreneurship/

COVID-19 public inquiry - a case of when, not if?

The British Academy — Wed, 09 Sep 2020 10:51:57 +0100

The pandemic of 2020 has caused untold disruption around the world, and the United Kingdom has suffered particularly seriously. What kind of public accounting will there be for the way in which the virus has played out in Britain? In this talk, Conor Gearty asks whether there will be a public inquiry and if so what shape it will take, and considers also the important role the law has to play in ensuring the success of any such inquiry that is set up.

The British Academy’s Shape the Future programme examines the societal, economic and cultural implications of the pandemic.

Speaker: Professor Conor Gearty FBA, Professor of Human Rights Law, London School of Economics

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-covid-19-public-enquiry-a-case-of-when-not-if/

Religion and the history of terrorism

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 12:26:18 +0100

In this 10-Minute Talk Richard English asks four questions about religion and terrorism: Should religion be seen as a cause for terroristic violence or a restraining influence upon it? Is religious terrorism an existential threat? Is religious terrorism something new? And should religion, in terms of its influence on terrorism, be seen as something that is a detachable part of that mixture? Speaker: Professor Richard English FBA, Distinguished Professorial Fellow, Senator George J. Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security and Justice, Queen’s University Belfast

Art historian, professor, writer, spy – the extraordinary story of Anthony Blunt

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 12:24:15 +0100

In November 1979, Margaret Thatcher exposed the distinguished art historian Anthony Blunt as a former Soviet spy - part of the infamous Cambridge Spy Ring who traded secrets with Moscow during the Second World War. Blunt’s unmasking provoked a media outcry that turned him into a national hate figure. In this 10-Minute Talk, President of the British Academy David Cannadine discusses the background to this extraordinary story. And he reveals how the British Academy itself got caught up in the public furore, leading to a showdown at its Annual General Meeting forty years ago this month, on the question of whether Blunt should be expelled from its membership.

'A Question of Retribution? The British Academy and the Matter of Anthony Blunt', edited by David Cannadine, was published on 23 July 2020.

Image: Anthony Blunt at a press conference, 20th November 1979 © Central Press / Stringer / Hulton Archive / Getty Images

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-art-historian-professor-writer-spy-the-extraordinary-story-of-anthony-blunt/

War, revolution and pandemic 1918-19

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 12:21:46 +0100

The 'Spanish Flu' of 1918-19 remains the most devastating pandemic of modern times, possibly killing up to 100 million people world wide. The loss of life massively exceeded the numbers killed during the First World War. Yet curiously its political, military and social impact was largely unrecognised at the time and is barely considered today. In this talk, Hew Strachan discusses the challenges the flu epidemic presents for the modern historian and provides some context for our own predicament today.

The British Academy's Shape the Future programme examines the societal, economic and cultural implications of the pandemic

Speaker: Professor Sir Hew Strachan FBA, Professor of International Relations, University of St Andrews; Emeritus Fellow, All Souls College, Oxford; Life Fellow, Corpus Christi College, Cambridge

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-war-revolution-and-pandemic-1918-19/

Keeping a diary in 1941

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 12:18:47 +0100

How do people manage when their lives are utterly transformed by circumstances beyond their control? Fiona Stafford discusses a diary kept by a woman in 1941, whose new normal involved rationing, restrictions, isolation and air raids. Speaker: Professor Fiona Stafford FBA, Professor of English Language and Literature; Tutorial Fellow, Somerville College, Oxford

The life and work of Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 12:01:11 +0100

Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806–1861) was one of the most popular poets of the Victorian period, remembered for her challenging poetry and courage of her views. In this 10-Minute Talk Isobel Armstrong discusses key stages of her life and work, from the courtship letters she wrote to her future husband through to the 19th century social and political issues which fed into her work.

Speaker: Professor Isobel Armstrong FBA Emeritus Professor of English, Birkbeck, University of London; Senior Research Fellow, Institute of English Studies; International Scholar, American Academy

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-the-life-and-work-of-elizabeth-barrett-browning/

Climate and war

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 11:57:21 +0100

The idea that climate change has caused, and will cause, war has been embraced by journalists and politicians, popular science writers and academics alike. However, this concept is not new. In this 10-Minute Talk David Livingstone looks back in history, tracing links between earlier writings about climate and violence and contemporary thinking.

Speaker: Professor David Livingstone FBA, Professor of Geography and Intellectual History, Queen's University Belfast

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-climate-and-war/

America first and American fascism

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 11:44:56 +0100

As ongoing protests against racial injustice and police brutality in the United States are met with militarised police action, tear gas, the National Guard, and threats of military intervention from representatives of the Trump administration and U.S. Congress, many observers are asking if this is what American fascism looks like. It is a question the Trump campaign itself raised when it decided to revive a forgotten political slogan, "America First" in 2016. In this 10-Minute Talk, Sarah Churchwell offers a brief history of "America First" and answers the perennial question of American fascism: can it happen here?

Speaker: Professor Sarah Churchwell, Chair of Public Understanding of the Humanities and Professorial Fellow in American Literature, IES, School of Advanced Study University of London and Director, Being Human Festival.

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-america-first-and-american-fascism/

Westminster Abbey - A Church in History

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 11:41:17 +0100

Westminster Abbey has a fascinating history to tell. As well as being a place of worship, it is an architectural masterpiece and treasure house of artefacts; the final resting place for some of the most significant people in Britain’s history; and the setting for every coronation since 1066 and numerous other royal occasions. In this talk, President of the British Academy David Cannadine discusses Westminster Abbey’s unique place in history and its meaning, significance and impact within society both in Britain and beyond.

Speaker: Professor Sir David Cannadine PBA, President, British Academy; Dodge Professor of History, Princeton University

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-westminster-abbey-a-church-in-history/

Theatre marketing and ballads in the time of Shakespeare

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 11:32:27 +0100

Why are Shakespeare plays filled with songs – not all of them relevant to the story? In this 10-Minute Talk, Tiffany Stern discusses sales of printed songtexts in Shakespeare’s London. She asks whether songs performed in, about or after plays were ‘product placement’ for theatre sales.

Speaker: Professor Tiffany Stern FBA, Professor of Shakespeare and Early Modern Drama, Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-theatre-marketing-and-ballads-in-the-time-of-shakespeare

Parenting for a digital future

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 11:28:07 +0100

Reflecting on years spent talking to parents, teachers and children about the influx of digital technologies in their lives, Sonia Livingstone will dispel some popular myths about screen time along with other techno-hype and fear-mongering, and offer some evidence-based suggestions to help maximise digital opportunities for children and minimise the risks.

Speaker: Professor Sonia Livingstone FBA, Professor of Social Psychology, Department of Media and Communications, LSE

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-parenting-for-a-digital-future/

Can watching films be good for us?

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 11:24:39 +0100

As a film historian, Ian Christie has become increasingly interested in how audiences respond to films, which we can now view in so many different ways. Having taken part in a large empirical study of film viewing across the UK in 2011, he identifies some of the benefits, including unexpected ones, that we may gain from our viewing - which may well be greater than usual at this time.

Speaker: Professor Ian Christie FBA, Professor of Film and Media History, Birkbeck, University of London

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-can-watching-films-be-good-for-us/

Philosophy in prison

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 11:10:54 +0100

If a society is measured by how it treats its worst off, we have reason to think hard and well about how we manage the lives of those in prison. Philosophy – in particular, the collaborative doing of philosophy – has here a role to play. Join M M McCabe as she explores how introducing philosophical discussion into prisons may matter.

To find out more, visit Philosophy in Prison: https://www.philosophyinprison.com/

Speaker: Professor M M McCabe FBA, Professor of Ancient Philosophy Emerita, King’s College London

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-philosophy-in-prison/

Music and wellbeing

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 11:02:09 +0100

Music can keep us physically, emotionally, and socially strong. But just how does music help? In this talk Tia DeNora considers everyday musical engagement as a way of regulating emotion, holding focus, managing pain and promoting social connection (including the sense of connection). She explores some of the reasons why music is a particularly valuable medium for wellbeing and suggests that this value derives from the interaction between what music offers and people’s resourcefulness as they interact with and care for music.

Speaker: Professor Tia DeNora FBA, Professor of Sociology of Music, University of Exeter

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-music-and-wellbeing/

How disabled people achieve good lives in three African countries

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 10:58:46 +0100

Tom Shakespeare discusses how people with a range of physical and sensory disabilities in Kenya, Uganda and Zambia have achieved educational, employment and family success. Drawing on the findings of a DFID-funded research project conducted with local academic partners, he highlights some of the stories shared and barriers overcome.

Speaker: Professor Tom Shakespeare FBA, Professor of Disability Research, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-how-disabled-people-achieve-good-lives-in-three-african-countries/

China's good war

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 10:51:58 +0100

This year marks the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II, in Asia as well as Europe. Today's China is drawing on its collective memory of the war against Japan to shape its politics at home (including "victory over the virus") and abroad, as it seeks to reshape international order in Asia. This talk explains what happened during World War II in China and why it matters so much for the politics and society of that country today.

Speaker: Professor Rana Mitter FBA, Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China, Director of the University China Centre, University of Oxford

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-chinas-good-war/

Making the real Thomas Cromwell stand up

The British Academy — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 10:49:16 +0100

Revd Professor Diarmaid MacCulloch Kt FBA talks about how to understand Thomas Cromwell, even though so many of his own letters have vanished from his vast surviving archive.

Speaker: Revd Professor Diarmaid MacCulloch Kt FBA, Professor of the History of the Church, University of Oxford; Fellow, St Cross College, Oxford

The world’s leading professors explain the latest thinking in the humanities and social sciences in just 10 minutes.

Transcript: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/podcasts/10-minute-talks-making-the-real-thomas-cromwell-stand-up/

10-Minute Talks

Symbolic Liberalism and Dialogical Sociology

Disability as a driver of change: depathologising the university

Why and how are machine learning algorithms are driving polarisation?

Fake News and the Victorians: Literature in the First Information Age

Figuring Forth: Cervantes’ Don Quijote, Poet in Prose

What can ancient civilisations teach us about sustainability?

Why are cities an important part of climate change?

Tutankhamun’s Table: Food & Drink for a King

Judith Butler on Gender

Who invented the potato? And why should we care?

The Man Who Shot Nelson: A French Take on Trafalgar

Why Truth is Not Enough

The 21st Century Resurgence of Eugenics

The Dead Sea Scrolls and Beginnings of Western Mysticism

The rise and fall of Matthew Hopkins, Witchfinder General

Schubert’s Die Forelle: how a classical music piece changes over time

'Salvator Mundi': Leonardo da Vinci's missing masterpiece?

What does a neuropsychologist do?

Traditional Japanese theatre and audience interaction

What are empires, nation states and colonialism?

Books in wartime: innocent victims or guilty parties?

What was the relationship between Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings?

Shakespeare in popular culture

What have sign languages taught us about human language development?

Aesthetics and emotions in pre-modern India

Freud, Hollywood and the male gaze

Genocide and International Law

Hannah Arendt's lessons for our times: the banality of evil, totalitarianism and statelessness

What is extremism?

South Asia, the partition of India and the birth of three nations

Plato, Aristotle and the question of self: what makes you 'you'?

Coffee as connection – tradition, controversy and literary representations

Why politics fails

What makes us social? Autism, mentalising, and the need for new labels

The Lion of the 17th: the story of Georges Dukson and the Liberation of Paris

Tragedy and Postcolonial Literature

Hypermasculine leadership

The politics of humiliation

Paradoxes of the Roman Arena

Public finances and the Union since 1707

The making of Oliver Cromwell

Poetry as Experience

Disastrous: thoughts on a pandemic inspired by ancient astrology

The 1951 UN Refugee Convention: its origins and significance

Syntax: where the magic happens

Looking at sign languages

The Shogun’s Silver Telescope: The East India Company and the English quest for Japan

Crèvecœur: What is an American?

Goods and possessions in late medieval England

Writing the history of the British Academy

The Early Foucault

George II Augustus von Welf, British King and German Prince-Elector

The Spectre of War - International Communism and the Origins of World War II

Women and mental health – talking about feelings

Napoleon and God

Choosing a title – George Eliot and 'The Mill on the Floss'

More than one language - why bilingualism matters

The miners’ strike of 1984-85

The nature of friendship

Spinoza on philosophising

Dealing with the past in Northern Ireland

What does the Good Friday Agreement mean?

The history of Belfast, a strange case of shared identity and sectarian division

China’s 14th Five Year Plan – the bold and the beautiful

In praise of Queen Astrid of Norway

The power of stories and the practice of rhetoric

The death of John Keats and his early reputation

The origins of Stonehenge

Charles Darwin and ideas of evolution

Saladin and the Crusades: medieval and modern perspectives

Donald Trump, Boris Johnson and warnings from Hannah Arendt

Atheism in debate

Religion, theology and the ultimate nature of reality

Racism and religion in America – sin and the elusive 'problem of seeing'

The Hitler Conspiracies

The function of cynicism at the present time

Dark data

Domestic and sexual violence during COVID-19

Science hasn't refuted free will

The Shogun’s Silver Telescope: The East India Company and the English quest for Japan